Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 05.pdf/319

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290

77/6' Green Bag.

ment, until such fine should be paid. For the refusal to discover the name of the writer of the letter, Mr. 'Moseley was sentenced to pay a further fine of,£2;, or to be imprisoned until the said fine should be paid. Mr. Moseley was also adjudged to pay the cost of the proceedings. Mr. Moseley was thereupon con veyed to prison. This sentence was set aside by the Governor, and the Privy Council curtly pronounced that the Chief-Justice was wrong, and the Governor was right.' Truly a case of a pine-apple of discord!

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"It is a custom among the guides and hunters in that vicinity to have camps in different localities for their use in hunting and fishing, having a permanent residence else where. Dunning does not claim to own the land in ques tion or any part of it. No notice of sale or to redeem was ever served upon Dunning or any of his family. I do not think it was necessary to serve notice upon him. . . . "It appears that it is the custom of the guides aim hunters of the North Woods to erect or establish socalled camps in various localities to be used by them m their hunting and fishing excursions; a single hunter might have several, located far apart in different patent!, or townships, and it is hardly conceivable that the occa sional and temporary use of these lodges or camps consti "ACTUAL OCCUPANCY." — In a recent case in the tutes an actual occupancy within the meaning of the New York Supreme Court, People v. Campbell (to statute, in the absence of any claim of title to the land appear in Hun's reports), it was held that the estab upon which the lodge or camp is located. The statute lishment of a hunting camp or lodge in the North seems to have contemplated an actual residence or dwell Woods by the building of a log house or hut, to be ing-house, it might be without claim of title, merely the used from time to time upon hunting and fishing possession of a squatter, but still the establishment of trips, with no other improvement or use of the land, a household; it reads: 'Such notice may be served peí by a person living elsewhere with his family, and sonally, or by leaving the same at the dwelling-house of with no claim or title to or interest in the land upon the occupant with any person of suitable age and discretion which the camp or hunting-lodge is established or belonging to his family.' "This evidently contemplates a dwelling-house upon the built, does not constitute an "actual occupancy land to be sold, upon the place claimed to be occupied; within the meaning of the statute requiring service it does not contemplate a service at the dwelling-house of of notice of a tax sale; and that the use of an island a person in New York City who has built a hunting-camp an acre in extent, in a lake in the North Woods, as in the North Woods which he uses from time to time fur a hunting-camp, without any use of the mainland, hunting and fishing. Dunning had his dwelling, his familv except to roam over it in pursuit of game, does not and place of actual residence six miles away. Undoubtedly constitute an actual occupancy of a whole tract on a person may have a residence in one place, and also occupy land in another, as in Stewart -'. Crysler, io;' the mainland of many thousand acres. The court N. Y. 378, where the land was used for the storage of lum observed : — her by a person who lived elsewhere; or, as in Leland •: Bennett, 5 Hill, 287, where a portion of the land was cul "Upon an island about one acre in extent, situated in a tivated, some of it used for pasture, and wood chopped lake bordering upon or included in the tract of land so and removed from it by a person who lived at a distance sold for taxes, the island being a part of such tract, the therefrom; but I do think that the establishing of a hum said Dunning erected a log building thirteen feet wide ing-camp, the building of a log-house to be used from and twenty-six feet in depth, the sides five or six feet in time to time upon hunting and fishing trips, with no other height, the middle of the building being about ten feet in improvement or use of the land, by a person living else height, the roof covered with bark. Inside, the building where with his family, with no claim of title to or interest was divided into two rooms by a log partition; the front in the land upon which the camp or hunting-lodge is was thirteen by fourteen feet, no floor to it, and used as a established or built, constitutes an actual occupancy within woodshed; the second room thirteen by twelve, with the meaning of the statute. But conceding that the facts a board floor and a window in the rear. It contained recited constitute an actual occupancy by Dunning, it a hunter's bed, three or four camp-stools, a stove with pipe would only be an occupancy of the island; it is separable going through the roof; a frying-pan, two or three kettles, water-pail, tea-pot, knives and forks, cups and saucers. I from this mainland, and was not used by him in conjunc tion with it in such a manner as to make him an occupant The island was uncultivated, the land uninclosed.and with of the whole tract. The use of an island, an acre in extent, no improvements upon it, except the log building I have as a hunting-camp, without any use of the mainland, except described. About six miles distant from this island in to roam over it in pursuit of game, does not, to my mind, another township Dunning resided with his family; having constitute an actual occupancy of the whole tract 01 there a dwelling-house and outbuildings, and about an 14,000 acres. Thompson r. Burhans. 6i N. Y. 52; Same acre of cultivated ground. Dunning is a hunter and guide, v. Same, 79 id. 93." and visited the log-house on the island from time to time, using it as a hunting and fishing station, and taking parties The two other judges concurred. there on hunting and fishing excursions.